Miracle Spices With Huge Health Benefits (and Big Flavor)

Spice up your life with these herbs, roots, and plants that benefit your health as much as they do your taste buds: From keeping your heart healthy and your arteries clear to reducing pain and warding off cancer, these everyday flavors will add a healthy punch to all your breakfasts, lunches, and dinners.

1. Chili Peppers

Add some heat to your dish with chili peppers -- and choose versions that are especially spicy to get the maximum amount of capsaicin. Capsacin, the ingredient that provides the plants with their spice, also has medical benefits that include pain relief, heart health, fighting prostate cancer, and stopping ulcers. If you’re ready to take on the hottest peppers out there, try habanero or Scotch bonnet; for less of a jolt, try jalapenos, Spanish pimentos, or cherry peppers.

2. Cinnamon

You already love cinnamon in pumpkin pie, cinnamon rolls, raisin bread, and cinnamon sugar topping, but there are healthier ways to reap the benefits of this power spice: Add it to your coffee, sprinkle it on oatmeal, stir it into peanut butter for celery sticks, and dash on sweet potatoes or carrots. While it brings out (and warms up) the flavors in the foods it is paired with, cinnamon will also help keep your arteries healthy, manage blood sugar levels, and lower cholesterol.

3. Tumeric

Brightly-colored turmeric comes from the same family of spices as ginger -- which means both plants can reduce inflammation in arthritis patients (and may block the formation of some cancers). Try it in a curry chicken dish from Planet Green’s Kelly Rossiter -- and then add black pepper, since that tabletop staple is believed to help the body absorb turmeric for maximum effect.